It was the coach who had to be strong for his team.

There are stories that break your heart, and stories that fill it. Usually, they are different stories. This one is the same.

"He didn't want us to play for him," said Lisa Fernandez, the pitcher and best player on the best women's softball team in the world. "That's the kind of man coach Candrea is. He never allowed his emotions to show. Because of what he means to us, (it) could have really took the team apart. He stayed strong for us. I can't even tell you how strong he is."

United States coach Mike Candrea is lifted up by his team after they beat Australia Monday. (AP photo)

Mike Candrea rubbed his wedding ring the whole game Tuesday. From the first inning, when his unbeatable women took a 3-0 lead on Australia, to the moment they ascended the medal stand, Candrea touched the ring of gold braid with the tiny diamond in the middle.

When someone asked him later what he would say to Sue Candrea, his wife of 28 years, Mike Candrea said, "Thank you."

The team was on tour in Wisconsin when it happened. Sue had quit her job as an accountant to follow Mike and his Olympians. She collapsed in the airport at Stevens Point, Wisc.

She died two days later.

There is a story Candrea tells that shows the kind of woman his wife was to him, how she became his gravity whenever his world started to spin from its perspective. One night a few years ago, Mike came home furious after a bad practice.

Sue let him go a few minutes, then offered this, which shut him down immediately:

"Mike," Sue said, "do me a favor. Walk around the neighborhood, knock on everyone's door and ask them if they really cared what happened to you today." The Candreas live in the country. It would have been a long walk.

Candrea went home five weeks ago and buried his wife. He took a few weeks to grieve and wonder, but not to quit. He needed to know that he had what it took to bury his grief deep enough his players couldn't see.

"Female athletes feed off emotions," Candrea explained. "I didn't want them to feel they had to look out for me. I had to step it up and be a leader." He cried a lot. He cried alone.

Candrea's version of courage has nothing to do with bucking fear. It's more about being tough in tough times. "This team is my courage."

The American women did what they came to do. They finished their slash-and-burn tour through the Olympics with a 5-1 win over the Aussies. Third baseman Crystl "Barry" Busto smacked two home runs. Fernandez pitched a complete game. The U.S. has won 79 in a row, three straight Olympic golds and is so utterly dominating, the dopes of the International Olympic Committee are considering dropping softball from the 2012 Games.

"The best team to ever put on the red, white and blue," said Fernandez, 31 years old, three times a gold medalist.

Barry "Big Mac" Busto hit a two-run homer to dead center in the first. "Sammy" Busto drilled a solo blast into the wind 320 feet to left her next time up. "Junior" Busto finished with an Olympic record five home runs in the nine games the U.S. played. She's 5-11, 205 and next April she'll be playing third for the Reds.

"It's scary when Bustos' swing is there," Candrea said.

Scary, too, what Candrea will do now. He had spent a month pouring his whole self into this one moment. We compartmentalize when we hurt, when we want to forget a tragedy, if only for a little while. Candrea will never forget Sue. He tried his best to forget his grief, or at least hide it.

Now, he will go home, a time Candrea said he is dreading. It will be too quiet, too anti-climactic. He has children, ages 21 and 24, but no one to share things with in the middle of the night. A letdown is inevitable after the best moment of anyone's life. Imagine the letting-down of Mike Candrea. "(Softball) is my sanctuary, an important part of the healing process," he said. "Right now I'm about ready to crash and burn."

For the women's softball team, passion met purpose at a sweet spot in time. They were crying - coach, players, all of them - as the team hoisted Mike Candrea on its shoulders after the game. The old rhythm and blues standard, Can't Turn You Loose, blared from the PA. He'd had a dream Monday night. He almost never dreams. Sue appeared in his room and said, "Chill out."

He'll try. But for now, allow him a moment of bliss, before the night falls. As it must. "I thanked 'em," Candrea said of his players. "I will never forget the ride they put me on."

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